Dear Jacek,
IMHO that is not exactly true if you mean registered chasers. I can make 1 QSO with any station whether he/she is a registered chaser or not to carry out a valid activation or 4 QSOs with any 4 different operators to achieve the points.
This is not unusual at all when activating during contests days.
73, Mikel
4 Likes
Agree, and if you check my logs you will see that is not the way I conduct my activations. Of course I will prefer to make the QSOs with chasers, but sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it.
Today I had a very tough activation, drived 250 Km, spent 4 hours hiking at temp -1C, with strong wind, and fingers almost freezed, just to be upset by a pair of silly -no other way to call them- people making noise. Not the common behavior fortunately, but enough to be angered. 
Perhaps this is the reason for my answer, don’t take it seriously. 
73 Mikel EA2CW
5 Likes
Hello Jarek @SP9MA
Yes you are right. He is doing well and taking a break. Then we wait and hope he comes back 
See you soon and best regards.
Marcel DM3FAM
3 Likes
It seems very difficult to stop in your favorite field. Sometimes it’s worth catching a breath, doing something else - in my opinion Sota is addictive, so I recommend caution. I appreciate the decisions of SP9AMH. The earth will spin with us and even without us … Leszek
6 Likes
It’s even good and necessary to stop from too much chasing or activating from time to time, just to see and realise that nothing happens without us for a while and, as Leszek said, the Earth will keep spining and the Sun rising every morning.
73,
Guru
6 Likes
Mariusz used to be a regular chaser of mine. I was always very impressed with his operating being truly QRP and how I would only hear him when all the big signal had been worked. He’d be there patiently waiting, his station had fabulous “ears” and he had a nice fist for his sending. I was often surprised at the bands and time of day we worked, he was often my ODX on 40m CW.
When I first started getting chased by you I would hear SP9MA and write SP9AM… and was waiting for the H. It took me a while to listen to what was sent not what I wanted to hear. 
5 Likes
SP-AM …would not be a good call sign 
or yet - one remembers it immediately
73 Armin
2 Likes
73, Jarek
1 Like
Walt G3NYY seems to be missing too.
1 Like
And Ken G3XQE, he just vanished a few years ago.
People often lose interest and do something else in ham radio or other hobbies. It could happen to any of us…
1 Like
If I go missing, please send a search party out. Oh hang on, parties are a bit controversial right now. Please send a search team out with booze.
13 Likes
Yes. I think what people are finding surprising is when people go ‘cold turkey’. Some of the missing where very, very active and then pfffft, nothing. You expect there to be less and less involvement not a sudden disappearance…
3 Likes
I remember that Steve @GW7AAV use to be a regular SOTA chaser and very often when activating SOTA summits, he would be one of my of my contacts on 2m FM. Occasionally use to work his XYL Helen @GW7AAU on 2m FM when activating SOTA summits also. However both of them have seemed to have vanished from quite a few years now so wondering what has happened with them and if anyone is still in contact with them.
Jimmy M0HGY
Yes Jimmy, also remember Steve and Helen. He gave up SOTA to do up a cottage in Wales as I remember and intended to come back into the side hobby but never did. He had good computer graphical skills and designed all those different SOTA Country icons which I used on one of my SOTA QSL card designs that I still send out. I think Steve and Helen left SOTA behind in the noughties. Pic:
Who was the very active G7 who broke his leg and never returned? Or maybe it was a heart attack. I’m not sure, but he was very active around the UK for a time, before SOTA became a truly international scheme.
73 Phil .
4 Likes
Ian G7KXV, had a knee replacement and did reappear briefly.
2 Likes
There seem to be a number of people in the database who have got to MG and then just stopped. Whether they have just stopped logging or have decided SOTA is done and have looked for the next thing to collect I don’t know.
To be fair, these are probably all normal people - that do something for a bit, get bored of it, move on and do something else. Not like us lot that have been obsessed with this thing for two decades.
Here’s a few more to throw into the mix…
@G1INK
@G4CPA
@M0LMP
@G6DDQ
@G0OXV
@M0ZZO
@G7LFC
@M0EIQ
@G3WPF
@G7ADF
@G0NES
@G0AZS
@G6MZX
@G4BLH
@G3RMD
@GW4BVE
@F6ENO
@G3OHC
@G4ERP
2 Likes
Some have Richard. For some the award was key and they do different things. For me I needed the exercise for health reasons and radio was a reward for the exercise. Then I got to MG and found I enjoy the exercise and being in the hill and the radio is now the icing on the cake.
7 Likes
I know for a fact that a well known SOTA activator who I know very well continues to activate SOTA summits including uniques, but has not logged his SOTA activations on the SOTA Database for a number of years now and doesn’t ever intend to log them or any future SOTA activations either. This is SOTA’s co-founder Richard @G3CWI .
Jimmy M0HGY
2 Likes